A year ago, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi described himself as the most persecuted person "in the entire history of the world". [BBC News 9 October 2010]
Clearly it's an important question: "Who is the most persecuted man in history?" And can you find a search engine that doesn't answer "Berlusconi"?
Let's try a similar question: America's most persecuted minority? Apparently either Big Business (Ayn Rand) or tobacco smokers. It's a good thing we have search engines to help us investigate such important questions.
So that led me to a third question: Does Big Businessman Berlusconi smoke? That question led me to an op-ed piece comparing Berlusconi's vices with those of President Obama [Maureen Dowd, Vice and Spice, NYTimes 23 June 2009]. Obama has admitted to a smoking habit; Berlusconi apparently admitted to paying millions of Euros to judges, before hastily correcting himself. No smokescreen without fire Silvio.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Sunday, September 26, 2010
God or Mammon?
It must make a nice change for #Vatican watchers to have a different kind of scandal. President Ettore Gotti Tedeschi and director-general Paolo Cipriani of the Vatican Institute for Religious Works (IOR) - basically the Vatican bank - are under investigation by Rome magistrates Nello Rossi and Stefano Fava for suspected money laundering [Reuters 21 September 2010].
A Vatican statement has expressed “perplexity and amazement” at the move and “utmost faith” (“massima fiducia”) in the two men who head the bank.
Given that the Catholic Church is in the faith business, I assume they have thought pretty carefully about the theological implications of that statement.
Update: Mr Tedeschi has now been removed from his post for "dereliction of duty" [BBC News 24 May 2012]. Dr Jeff Mirus speculates that Tedeschi’s frequent comments on world economic affairs may have rubbed many others in the Vatican the wrong way, perhaps particularly those at the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace [City Gates, 25 May 2012].
A Vatican statement has expressed “perplexity and amazement” at the move and “utmost faith” (“massima fiducia”) in the two men who head the bank.
Given that the Catholic Church is in the faith business, I assume they have thought pretty carefully about the theological implications of that statement.
Update: Mr Tedeschi has now been removed from his post for "dereliction of duty" [BBC News 24 May 2012]. Dr Jeff Mirus speculates that Tedeschi’s frequent comments on world economic affairs may have rubbed many others in the Vatican the wrong way, perhaps particularly those at the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace [City Gates, 25 May 2012].
Friday, September 24, 2010
Pork Scratchings 2
"A new transatlantic row is unfolding after the US introduced a $14 entry fee for EU travellers, with the European Commission analysing possible retaliatory measures. ... Privately, US officials admit that promoting tourism at the expense of incoming travellers is self-contradictory, but Mr Reid managed to muscle through his proposal in return for his key support on the health care bill passed earlier this year." [EU Observer 24 September 2010 via @futureidentity]
In American politics, crazy and contradictory initiatives like this are often produced by coupling separate initiatives to gain political support. I think this probably comes under the category of "pork". See my earlier post on Pork Scratchings.
In American politics, crazy and contradictory initiatives like this are often produced by coupling separate initiatives to gain political support. I think this probably comes under the category of "pork". See my earlier post on Pork Scratchings.
Monday, September 13, 2010
Purpose of Miracles
Several writers have expressed scepticism about a miraculous cure from back pain following routine surgery. The patient himself, who happens to be a deacon of the Catholic Church, has attributed his cure to a picture of Cardinal Newman [BBC News 13 September 2010].
@mjrobbins asked Is God scraping the barrel for miracles? (Guardian 13 Sept 2010) and suggested that Vatican's latest miracle is evidence of a worrying decline in God's powers.
But clearly the purpose of this particular miracle was to allow Vatican to beatify a Cardinal whose own view of such professed miracles is expressed in the following passage from his first essay on Miracles:
Similar controversy surrounds the miracle attributed to Mother Teresa for the purposes of her beatification.
In March 2010, the miracle cure attributed to the late Pope John Paul II, for the purposes of his beatification, ran into some difficulties.
If a dramatic and unexpected cure can be regarded as a miracle, what about a dramatic and unexpected death?
For example, an 80-year-old Spanish cardinal Agustin Garcia Gasco Vicente, in Rome for the beatification of late pope John Paul II in May 2011, died of a heart attack shortly before the start of the ceremony. [News24 1 May 2011].
For another example, an Italian man was killed when a giant crucifix toppled on top of him. The crucifix had been erected to celebrate the canonization of the late Pope John Paul II in April 2014. In a bizarre twist, the dead man is said to have been living in his home town of Lovere on a street named after Pope John XXIII, who was to be canonized on the same day. (BBC News 24 April 2014, Christian Today 25 April 2014, Huffington Post 25 April 2014).
Don't these deaths cancel out the miracles?
Update 2019
A second miracle has been attributed to Cardinal Newman, which will allow Pope Francis to declare him a saint. "I was healed by Cardinal Newman" (Catholic Herald, 5 July 2019). This one seems less amenable to a conventional medical explanation, but how does it satisfty the cardinal's own notion of what might count as a miracle? After all, Newman thought it was "often very difficult to distinguish between a providence and a miracle". The key question seems to be about agency - to what extent can the cure be credited to Newman himself (because the woman cured had been praying to him) rather than to God alone (which Newman referred to as providential mercy).
Commentators have also observed that both the miracles attributed to Newman occurred in the United States. Newman's view was that miracles were more likely to occur "in a country in which faith and prayer abound".
See also
Adam Buick, Newman on Miracles (The Sceptic, 22 September 2010)
Christopher Howse, Cardinal Newman's miraculous bones (Telegraph, 23 Aug 2008)
Colbert I. King, This country is in need of a miracle (Washington Post, 19 April 2019)
Peter Le, David Hume and Henry Newman on Miracle (undated)
Garry Wills, Stealing Newman, (NYR Blog September 2010), Does the Pope Matter? (NYR Blog March 2013), Popes Making Popes Saints (NYR Blog July 2013).
Papal Canonizations a Lesson in Subtle Art of Catholic Politics (Newsmax 25 April 2014)
Wikipedia: Canonisation of John Henry Newman, Mother Theresa
Updated 7 July 2019
@mjrobbins asked Is God scraping the barrel for miracles? (Guardian 13 Sept 2010) and suggested that Vatican's latest miracle is evidence of a worrying decline in God's powers.
But clearly the purpose of this particular miracle was to allow Vatican to beatify a Cardinal whose own view of such professed miracles is expressed in the following passage from his first essay on Miracles:
"Much more inconclusive are those which are actually attended by a physical cause known or suspected to be adequate to their production. Some of those who were cured at the tomb of the Abbé Paris were at the time making use of the usual remedies; the person whose inflamed eye was relieved was, during his attendance at the sepulchre, under the care of an eminent oculist; another was cured of a lameness in the knee by the mere effort to kneel at the tomb. Arnobius challenges the Heathens to produce one of the pretended miracles of their gods performed without the application of some prescription." [Essays on Miracles]
Similar controversy surrounds the miracle attributed to Mother Teresa for the purposes of her beatification.
In 2002, the Vatican recognized as a miracle the healing of a tumor in the abdomen of an Indian woman, Monica Besra, after the application of a locket containing Mother Teresa's picture. Besra said that a beam of light emanated from the picture, curing the cancerous tumor. Critics — including some of Besra's medical staff and, initially, Besra's husband — insisted that conventional medical treatment had eradicated the tumor [Wikipedia: Mother Teresa].
In March 2010, the miracle cure attributed to the late Pope John Paul II, for the purposes of his beatification, ran into some difficulties.
The inexplicable cure of a young French nun from Parkinson's disease ... seemed difficult for the Vatican to certify as a miracle. According to the Vatican's own rules, the medically inexplicable cure must be instantaneous, complete, and lasting. Some are arguing that the world will have to wait her entire lifetime to determine whether it was lasting, in case the symptoms return. In addition, doubts have been cast about whether she had Parkinson's to begin with [Miracle under scrutiny in John Paul beatification Independent, 29 March 2010].
Within a year, Pope Benedict XVI formally approved this miracle [BBC News 14 January 2011]. Obviously he had no choice. "Nuns can be very useful." [Jesus and Mo, 16 April 2007]
During 2013, a second miracle emerged to enable Pope John Paul II to be canonized. This took the form of a mere memory of the late pope, which was able to emerge from somewhere (a diary perhaps) and cure somebody. (This sounds suspiciously like a horcrux. Clearly the Jesuits have been twisting the Harry Potter books for their own purposes.)
The Holy See has yet to reveal what the miracle was or where and when it took place but Vatican sources said it would “amaze the world”.
Nick Squires, Vatican to announce John Paul II 'miracle' (Telegraph, 19 Jun 2013). See also Barbie Latza Nadeau, After Second Approved Miracle, Pope John Paul II Likely to Become a Saint (Daily Beast July 2013). Pope John Paul II and the trouble with miracles (LA Times, July 2013).
Lacking the sophisticated theological thinking with which the Vatican is blessed, or the devious logic often associated with the Jesuits, popular journalism tends to describe all cases of unexplained recovery as miraculous. For example, an elderly widower appears to have regained his sight after kissing a photograph of his late wife.
It's a miracle! Daily Mail 17 Feb 2011. Obituary notice November 2009.
Meanwhile Lourdes. In 2007, Pope Benedict offered special indulgencies for anyone visiting the site of the Virgin Mary's miraculous appearance in the 150th anniversary year. The BBC offered the following explanation for the spiritually unenlightened.
Indulgences became infamous in the 16th century for being sold rather than earned, helping, historians say, trigger the Protestant reformation. While some might consider indulgences an outdated concept, great spiritual importance have been assigned to them by Benedict XVI and his predecessor, Pope John Paul II.BBC News 6 December 2007
If a dramatic and unexpected cure can be regarded as a miracle, what about a dramatic and unexpected death?
For example, an 80-year-old Spanish cardinal Agustin Garcia Gasco Vicente, in Rome for the beatification of late pope John Paul II in May 2011, died of a heart attack shortly before the start of the ceremony. [News24 1 May 2011].
For another example, an Italian man was killed when a giant crucifix toppled on top of him. The crucifix had been erected to celebrate the canonization of the late Pope John Paul II in April 2014. In a bizarre twist, the dead man is said to have been living in his home town of Lovere on a street named after Pope John XXIII, who was to be canonized on the same day. (BBC News 24 April 2014, Christian Today 25 April 2014, Huffington Post 25 April 2014).
Don't these deaths cancel out the miracles?
Update 2019
A second miracle has been attributed to Cardinal Newman, which will allow Pope Francis to declare him a saint. "I was healed by Cardinal Newman" (Catholic Herald, 5 July 2019). This one seems less amenable to a conventional medical explanation, but how does it satisfty the cardinal's own notion of what might count as a miracle? After all, Newman thought it was "often very difficult to distinguish between a providence and a miracle". The key question seems to be about agency - to what extent can the cure be credited to Newman himself (because the woman cured had been praying to him) rather than to God alone (which Newman referred to as providential mercy).
Commentators have also observed that both the miracles attributed to Newman occurred in the United States. Newman's view was that miracles were more likely to occur "in a country in which faith and prayer abound".
See also
Adam Buick, Newman on Miracles (The Sceptic, 22 September 2010)
Christopher Howse, Cardinal Newman's miraculous bones (Telegraph, 23 Aug 2008)
Colbert I. King, This country is in need of a miracle (Washington Post, 19 April 2019)
Peter Le, David Hume and Henry Newman on Miracle (undated)
Garry Wills, Stealing Newman, (NYR Blog September 2010), Does the Pope Matter? (NYR Blog March 2013), Popes Making Popes Saints (NYR Blog July 2013).
Papal Canonizations a Lesson in Subtle Art of Catholic Politics (Newsmax 25 April 2014)
Wikipedia: Canonisation of John Henry Newman, Mother Theresa
Updated 7 July 2019
Wednesday, September 08, 2010
Dove World Outrage Center
A tiny church in Florida is punching above its weight by threatening to burn copies of the Qur'an on 11 September. The pastor appears to have no knowledge of what the Qur'an actually says, but has convinced himself and his followers that the Qur'an is "full of lies" [BBC News 8 September 2010].
This threat has attracted wide publicity, and has been condemned by American and other Western leaders including
There is a general problem with protesting against extremism of all kinds, which is that such protests are often counter-productive, merely alienating the extremists and reinforcing their beliefs. But what is the alternative? In this case, there is an obvious remedy: I hope that Christian leaders, especially in America, have the courage to organize mass readings of the holy books of other religions, including the Qur'an, in order to demonstrate that their faith is compatible with many of the truths contained in these religions.
Meanwhile, people are sending books for the bonfire. Some of these books may be genuine copies of the Qur'an, but I expect that a few tricksters will be sending in disguised copies of the Bible and the American Constitution to be burned as well. Ha!
This threat has attracted wide publicity, and has been condemned by American and other Western leaders including
- Tony Blair, former British prime minister
- Hillary Clinton, US Secretary of State
- Robert Gates, US Secretary of Defense
- Eric Holder, US Attorney General
- Ban Ki-Moon, UN Secretary General
- Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, former archbishop of Washington
- Peter MacKay, Canadian Defence Minister
- General David Petraeus, the top US commander in Afghanistan
- Anders Fogh Rasmussen, NATO Secretary General
There is a general problem with protesting against extremism of all kinds, which is that such protests are often counter-productive, merely alienating the extremists and reinforcing their beliefs. But what is the alternative? In this case, there is an obvious remedy: I hope that Christian leaders, especially in America, have the courage to organize mass readings of the holy books of other religions, including the Qur'an, in order to demonstrate that their faith is compatible with many of the truths contained in these religions.
Meanwhile, people are sending books for the bonfire. Some of these books may be genuine copies of the Qur'an, but I expect that a few tricksters will be sending in disguised copies of the Bible and the American Constitution to be burned as well. Ha!
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